


Black Widow: An Interregnum Full of Peanut Butter Sandwiches

by dhaggard



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Gen, peanut butter sandwiches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-21
Updated: 2020-03-21
Packaged: 2021-03-01 00:46:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23246488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dhaggard/pseuds/dhaggard
Summary: Natasha Romanov -- post-Thanos's decapitation; pre-Tony agreeing to help Scott.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 5





	Black Widow: An Interregnum Full of Peanut Butter Sandwiches

Natasha is always busy. Always working towards a solution. Solutions. Solutions that might lead to a possible solution.

This is not an expression of hope so much as a pattern of habits born out of the desire for hope.

The cycle is endless: gather information, analyze information, discuss the information (if discussion is even possible--the others are never around and when they are they mostly defer to her and so she finds more and more that she just makes the call not necessarily with the belief that it's the right call but just so a decision has been made), make decisions based on the analysis and discussion of the information (and, boy, is she tired of making decisions), deploy the needed resources (there are never enough resources for all the needs), and then do it all over again. And again. And again. All the time wondering if it's any use at all.

She shouldn't have to be doing this. Fury should be here. Or Maria Hill. Or even Tony. Tony isn't the best manager of people. But he's good at seeing the big picture.

Tony is no longer interested in the big picture. He's resigned himself to a domestic life. No, that's not fair. If anyone deserves it, it's Tony.

Sometimes Natasha wishes she could do the same. But she can't. She wasn't trained to just let things go. To not do all that needs to be done. 

Pepper helps as much as she can in between caring for her two children (unfair to call Tony a child, perhaps; but, then again, he kind of always was one). She just has too many responsibilities to have time for Natasha.

So does Carol. Oh, she checks in. But she's always distracted, half-listening, prone to cutting the connection at a moment's notice. She has the rest of the galaxy to worry about. Natasha tries to support her efforts. But to be honest there's not much she can do from earth.

And to be painfully honest, sometimes she wonders if Carol is busying herself with the rest of the universe so she doesn't have time to think about exploring the possibility of reversing The Snap. Always blazing forward because she is afraid to look back.

Which means Natasha has to keep the slim hope alive. The hope that is not a hope but is a wish for even just a glimmer of hope.

Sometimes she wishes the boys would be of more help. They had all been so ready to take up arms and fight the Big Fight, but once the Purple Guy's head gets chopped off, there's nothing tangible left to fight. And the boys just can't seem to wrap their brains around what it takes to keep everything together now. To make incremental progress. To come up empty time and time again, but keep trying and searching. 

Sometimes she's glad they just do what she says. Or ignore what she asks. Content to let her take the lead.

Sometimes she wishes they would do more. And ask more of her. 

Steve does what he can. But what does he know about logistics? About intelligence gathering? About politics? About infrastructure? He was a soldier. And before that a public relations stunt. And this world is not his world. Or rather the world that was before, the one he awoke to, was not his world. And so while he lost people---so many people--he had already experienced everything he had ever known shifting under his feet. 

And sometimes he seems all too fine with this new world that isn't either of their worlds. The world where everybody feels displaced. Where everyone is more open about pain and loss. The world where a pod of whales swims up the Hudson. 

No, not fine.

But willing to embrace the absences all around. As if his grief over losing Bucky again was a symbol for all the other losses in the world. As if grief could sustain everyone. As if mourning were a presence that could fill all the missing shapes. Or at least hazily form the outlines of those shapes. 

Natasha doesn't have time to mourn.

And she surely doesn't have time to wallow in it like Thor does.

Thor never got over the fact that it was impossible to win once the Infinity Stones were destroyed. That all the losses racked up on the way to that stupid little hut on that stupid little planet weren't sacrifices leading to an ultimate victory. That the victory conditions were gone before they stepped foot on the planet. Before they knew where the planet was. That the sharp, quick blow of the ax was a meaningless act.

Bruce wallowed too. But then, suddenly, he was fine. Sort of fine.

And now Bruce is gone from her.

Oh, sure, Smart Hulk will answer a technical question every so often. But this happy medium he's found is much too medium. And seemingly--as much as he claims otherwise--much too precarious to maintain for him to do any real work.

She gets it. Everybody is afraid of the Big Green Guy.

And she knows more than anyone how terrifying Bruce found being the Little Guy--not just terrified that any moment he'd get triggered into becoming the Big Guy, but terrified that the worst of what the Big Guy was wasn't actually him--it was simply a reflection of who the Little Guy actually was, actually had become.

It's hard being so aware of the damage you're capable of inflicting on others. It's almost impossible living with all the damage you've already done.

Even so. It's still strange how happy Bruce is with this new identity of his. 

Strange, at least to, to her. Who had gone through how many identities? More than enough for several lifetimes.

Each identity a crisis in and of itself. A relief now to be just Natasha. Not exactly herself. But the Natasha who does all this (and more).

But then...

Clint.

She tries not to think about Clint.

She is always thinking about Clint. Tracking Clint. Sending Rhodey on missions where she has to brace herself for his reports back. Desperately hoping it wasn't Clint this time.

Even more desperately hoping there are still some lines he won't cross.

And she is angry. Not just angry about what he has done. Angry about what he might do. And even more angry that his extreme reaction to his loss overwhelms, ignores, wipes away the fact that it was also her loss.

Steve teases her about the peanut butter sandwiches.

And to be fair, part of the reason is that they're easy. They're one less decision to make.

But she hasn't told Steve yet why she started making them. That they aren't just some classic American comfort food. That they're a specific American comfort food.

She'd told Laura that she'd make dinner the next time she visited the ranch.

She'd ordered a bunch of stuff online. Packaged everything up. All she needed was the Cornish game hens.

But then there was this op she got pulled into. And she was worried the game hens would go bad. So she packed them in ice and sent Clint ahead but forgot to tell him to have Laura unpack them and so when she finally gets to the ranch they're frozen solid, and there's not enough time to defrost them before dinner. Or at least not enough time to do them right, and if she's going to make dinner she wants to do it right.

And she's trying to explain this to Laura, and Laura puts a hand on her forearm, and Natasha doesn't flinch, and Laura says that it's okay. That she should spend what time she has with the kids. That the kids need Aunt Nat. And that there's nothing wrong with peanut butter sandwiches for dinner. That the point is to spend time together.

And so that's what they do. Everyone together. Laura breaks out the strawberry freezer jam, and the grape jelly, and the honey made by the old hippy couple who live down the road. And Natasha remembers the red currant jelly that she was going to use on the game hens. And Laura sets up a make your own peanut butter sandwich bar while Aunt Nat teaches Cooper and Lila and Nate how to do back handsprings.

And when they all came in and make their sandwiches, Clint jokes that, of course, Natasha would bring red currant jelly. And Laura explains to the kids that it's a joke about her hair, but also about how Aunt Nat is sweet but also tart. And Lila makes two sandwiches and spreads the red currant jelly on both. And Natasha has the same thing, and nothing's ever tasted so good.

She has a hard time finding red currant jelly. But that's okay. It's not about the jelly. It's about the bread and the peanut butter. And Laura. And the kids.

And he has no right to take his grief and splatter it across the world.

Not while she has to keep cleaning up his messes and try to keep him from doing the worst while takes her grief and contains it within her. A grief that sometimes feels like it's leaking out of her in endless dark wisps. And more often feels like it's a hard, wine-colored gemstone deep in the pit of her stomach.

But what else is she going to do?

Nobody else is going to do all this. Nobody else is going to sit in the center of an ever expanding, increasingly fragile web. Sensitive to every movement no matter how small. Desperately spinning it out more and more. Reaching out until somewhere there's the slightest tremble, the tiniest tremor of something that could perhaps lead to something more.

And maybe--just maybe--Scott has something.

Something that's real this time.

Something that's a little bit like hope.


End file.
